Kuala Lumpur, 19 Sep 2012 – INCEIF today signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Islamic Corporation for the Development of the Private Sector (ICD) and The Centre Africain D’Etude Supérieure en Gestion (CESAG) to impart training and education in Islamic finance to West African French speaking countries with the establishment of an Islamic Finance Academy in the region.
ICD is the private sector arm of the Islamic Development Bank Group (IDB) while CESAG is the training institute of the Central Bank of the West African States which comprises eight countries namely Côte d’Ivoire, Benin, Mali, Bissau Guinea, Niger, Senegal, Burkina Faso and Togo. CESAG provides management training, research and consultancy services.
INCEIF President & CEO Mr Daud Vicary Abdullah signed the MoU on behalf of INCEIF and ICD Chief Executive Officer Mr. Khaled Al-Aboodi for ICD. The signing ceremony was also attended by Dr. Abdulaziz al-Hinai, the IDB Group Vice President (Finance).

Chief Executive Officer Mr. Khaled Al-Aboodi(Left) and INCEIF President & CEO Mr. Daud Vicary Abdullah signing the MoU.
Following the collaboration, the partners hope to create awareness and interest among policy makers and captains of industry on the need to nurture qualified talent to develop and sustain the Islamic finance services in the West African region. In the long term, there are plans to set up an academy that offers Islamic finance education for the region.
ICD has been taking a proactive role in promoting Islamic finance across its 56- member countries including a substantial number of West African states. In recent years, in co-operation with Turkey’s Bank Asya, ICD has established Tamweel Africa which owns and manages several Islamic banks in Guinea, Mauritania, Niger and Senegal.
This is the second collaboration between INCEIF and ICD. In November last year, INCEIF signed a Memorandum of Agreement with ICD on its talent management programme. Following the MoA, INCEIF has delivered postgraduate Islamic finance programme through its Chartered Islamic Finance Professional (CIFP) programme to selected participants from ICD member countries.  ICD complemented the participants learning experience through corporate attachments within ICD and the IDB group as well as ICD’s investee companies globally.